GRASP’s ability to deliver a strong, unified message on behalf of great ape conservation is one of its greatest assets. GRASP engages with government officials, decision-makers and other relevant stakeholders at national and international levels to change attitudes, increase political will and hold political and social debate regarding great ape conservation at the highest possible levels.
GRASP uses various channels and networks to share information and raise awareness of the plight of the great apes. These include international conferences, engagement with political leaders and the private sector, public talks, statements and presentations, as well as social media to reach a vast audience. Targeting the general public specifically, GRASP has developed the apeAPP mobile phone application to share news and information about great apes.
Many of the 23 great ape range states are plagued by civil unrest, armed conflicts, regional disputes and human-wildlife conflict. Most range states in Central and Western Africa are also rich in natural resources, such as oil, minerals, or timber. These sectors can be very volatile in inflicting local resentment and conflicts. This is particularly the case when land tenure is poorly managed, criminal networks become involved in business, or irresponsible companies and local authorities ignore environmental impacts or exclude affected communities from decision-making.
GRASP promotes conflict-sensitive solutions through environmental peace-building in great ape conservation. Like other wildlife, great apes can offer a viable and neutral entry point for cooperation and peace-building, thereby promoting stability and sustainable development in areas where armed conflicts affect great ape and human populations. GRASP is also heavily involved in finding inclusive and conservation-based solutions to conflicts fueled by extractive and agricultural concessions or illegal small-scale activities. By involving all parties, GRASP works as a moderator to promote sustainable ecosystem management, improved transparency through monitoring and standardization and alternative employment and livelihoods as building blocks for peaceful development.
Habitat destruction and fragmentation are the primary threats to great ape survival in Africa and Southeast Asia. Healthy great ape populations critically depend on the forests in which they live, but these ecosystems are increasingly threatened by expanding agricultural plantations, commercial logging operations and the extractives sector. While these industries can help lift people out of poverty, their operations should be sensitive to the local biodiversity values and ecosystem services, on which wildlife and local communities heavily rely on.
GRASP seeks to develop holistic and inclusive approaches to sustainable land use management. The partnership works together with national authorities, local communities, civil society and the private sector to design solutions for better protection of great ape habitats, while safeguarding local livelihoods. Through mutual cooperation and inclusive planning, the aim is to strengthen protected areas, involve communities in conservation management and create corridors to allow wildlife to migrate between fragmented habitats. In addition, GRASP supports national and trans-boundary integrated land use planning and seeks strategies to sustainably accommodate economic activities in great ape habitats.
GRASP works to ensure the inclusion of great ape conservation issues in other international processes, such as the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) and the Roundtable for Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). The partnership also advocates for inclusion of great apes and their habitats in the decision-making of development partners such as the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation and the European Union, among others.
GRASP maintains a strong focus on sustainable development, acknowledging the fact that development and economic growth will continue to expand across the globe. GRASP fosters great ape conservation efforts that provide growth in income, employment, human well-being and equity at minimal loss of biodiversity. Such outcomes can be achieved through ‘green economy’ approaches, which focus on maintaining species populations, habitats and their environmental services, while encouraging local, regional and international investment in projects that offer economic and social gain.
On the one hand, GRASP works with national governments and the international community to support the adoption of more sustainable practices within the resource-extracting sectors that already exist in certain range states. In particular, this concerns palm oil production, commercial logging and extractives sector. Such work aims to minimize the environmental risks that these sectors pose and prevent subsequent degradation of natural ecosystems. On the other hand, GRASP seeks ways to integrate conservation outcomes with economic gain. This can be achieved through eco-tourism support and stronger involvement of communities in wildlife area management, by training and employing community rangers and distributing other conservation-related income. In addition, GRASP advocates for and collaborates with alternative economic benefit sharing approaches, such as the Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES), and Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+), just to mention a few.
We share up to 98% of our DNA with great apes; such significant genetic similarity means that diseases are easily transmissible between humans and great apes. In this way, great apes are susceptible to the same deadly diseases that can affect humans, including Ebola, Anthrax and Marburg, with the risk of transmission growing as human populations expand into great ape territories.
GRASP collaborates with global health organisations and international experts to monitor and mitigate the effects of infectious diseases, improve national capacities for disease control and management and promote safeguards to protect the health of great ape populations and adjacent human populations.
The illicit traffic in live great apes and body parts, whether for international pet trade, demand from zoos, bushmeat consumption or for use in medicine or cultural ceremonies, represents a considerable threat to the species’ survival. GRASP works with CITES, INTERPOL, EAGLE Network and other prominent actors to strengthen the legal protection of great apes by improving national legislation and law enforcement efforts, promoting successful prosecutions, and highlighting existing gaps and opportunities to further improve the legal environment.
In collaboration with the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, GRASP launched the Great Apes Seizures Database in 2016. It is the first global system to gauge the scale and scope of poaching and illegal ape trade. The database is an online reporting tool designed to assist national authorities, civil society and businesses to monitor and act on illegal trade in live animals, body parts and bush meat. The database is continuously being updated, alongside planning of a more extensive Phase 2, which will further enhance the technical and analytical functionalities, as well as the geographic and sectoral scope of the data collected.